Copywriting Mistakes To Avoid Like The Plague

Being a copywriter can command you a lot of respect. But people who start off with it usually find themselves in between tons of mistakes. You should try to learn about some of these mistakes so you don’t end up committing them.

The most common mistake new copywriters make is not getting to know their products so that they can give people details about them. Not knowing anything about your products means your sales copy won’t be thorough and your prospects will automatically suspect something’s up. This is why it’s necessary to study your products so that you don’t leave anything out when describing them to your prospects because that will make them trust you more, and they’ll buy more from you, too. For instance, if you are offering an e-book that’s called ‘dog training, you need to be able to give the prospects just enough free information and save the good information for the book. Your skill lies in how you can effectively play with words to convince the prospect about the product, and in order to do that you have to be fully aware of both, the negatives and the positives of the product. When you have studied your product and you have learned all there is to know, you’ll easily be able to go into detail to your prospects about the benefits of the product and why it’s necessary that they purchase it.|A huge mistake beginning copywriters often make is spending all their time talking the product up and telling others what awesome features it possesses. You must comprehend that people won’t be interested in what the product is or what it can do, they only want to know what it can do for them. Your prospects are going to want to know what they’ll get out of the product and why they should spend their money on it. You should understand that there are probably a dozen or more products on the market just like yours that do things similar. That’s why, if you want to steal the purchase away from those competing against you, you need to be very clear about what your prospects will get out of the purchase. This is why it becomes necessary to put your benefits in the copy instead of the features. The best way to handle this is to mention a feature and then follow it up with a benefit. Copywriting is about selling dreams and hopes. It’s about telling people that there is an answer to what they’re going through and that they can find the answer easily. Nobody wants to know what sophisticated technology you used in your software tool, but they would definitely be interested in what the software can do for them. This is one basic rule that you’ll always want to keep in the back of your mind.|One general rule about copywriting is you almost always want to avoid the use of negative words – probably about 99.9% of the time. You simply need to find an alternative way of expressing something negative. You’ll encounter lots of situations that could use a negative contraction or negative comparison. Some people will argue that there are times when you just have to use negative words, and that is incorrect.

In the end the purpose of your copy is to sell, and really that is it.|When you writing your sales copy, you must use punctuation in the right manner or else people may misconstrue what you’re trying to say. Copywriting involves using the right words and sentence structuring to convince the prospect about the advantages offered by your product. You might have a great product, but if your copy isn’t professional, people are going to view the product as unprofessional and, essentially, no good. What’s the extent of these mistakes? You may not believe this but some copywriters use a semi colon when they really should be using commas in some instances. If you have sales copy that has continuous mistakes, you won’t make a good impression on the prospect. You don’t have to write English that sounds like you’re an English professor, but your punctuation should always be correct. Keep in mind that when your grammar’s good, you will look as professional as possible and the customer will know exactly what you’re trying to say.|Always keep in mind that your sales copy will succeed only when you are clear with your prospects. This is not only in terms of the language you use, but also how you structure your copy. Lots of copywriters don’t remember this part and they leave out very important stuff like subheadings. This is something that should be obvious, but all copywriters need to make sure they don’t make it. Your sales copy is only a really long piece of content that you write with the purpose of giving the prospects all the benefits of the product so that they’re more likely to buy. Now it’s important to make sure that prospects can not only read what you’ve written, but that they fully comprehend what you’re saying. If you aren’t using subheadings, your prospects won’t be able to glean the information they need if they just scan through it. Most people reading sales letters online aren’t going to take the time to read every single word. The first thing they do is scan through the copy and then if they find something interesting, they start reading from there. That’s why you’ll want to make sure your copy is written in little pieces that come together just like a jigsaw puzzle. When you use subheadings, you are helping prospects find the points they desire and you’re also making your copy easier to view and digest. That doesn’t mean that you should overrun your copy with subheadings. Only use them when they’re absolutely needed.

Your sales copy’s job is to make sure your prospects want to buy the product, and then it should urge them to buy. Now when we talk about convincing, you should leave absolutely no stones unturned. That’s why you’ll want to make sure you include testimonials so that your prospects understand more about your product and they also get to see what others think of it. Your prospects will always feel at ease when they see that there are others who have used your product and that they had positive experiences with it. People are always wary about buying things, especially when they see that thing on the internet. This is why it’s essential to talk to customers you’ve assisted previously, as well as professionals in your niche so that they can write a few nice words for you. This helps the prospect feel relieved and makes it easy for him/her to take action and actually buy the product. The testimonials could be written or they could even be put into audio or video format.

Don’t make the blunder of not making the benefits clear in your copy by using bullets. Your prospects aren’t interested in all the features, they just want to know what they’ll get out of it. So if you put your benefits in the copy with bullet points, your prospects will digest them more easily. This is a simple tip that all copywriters need to use.

If you want to know how to be a great copywriter, just avoid the mistakes you just learned about and you’ll succeed in no time.

Joe Simpson is a full time marketer and trainer with a strong interest in Internet privacy – Anonymous surfing. He promotes products all across the world and uses local servers such as a UK proxy to reach his target markets as required.